Do they really has a distaste for seeing my butt? I would think they would be pretty neutral on the subject, honestly. It’s just a body part. Tjey see lots of body parts.
I did fertility treatments 25 years ago and injected myself in the thigh. But arms are easy to get to - anything that involves taking off your pants is more difficult.
(Which is a good reminder for those getting vaccinated - wear a short sleeved shirt and put a jacket over it if its cold. Its like wearing shoes that slip on and off at an airport - its just easier).
Your doctor or nurse has seen many thousands of patients. The butt is a neutral body part like everything else. If there is a good reason to see your butt than one wouldn’t think twice. If there was need to do a prostate exam, treat a thrombosed haemorrhoid, examine an ingrown hair or incise an abcess one does it.
But this does not mean patients always consider the butt a neutral body part or always feel neutral about displaying it. Doctors and nurses are sensitive to these concerns. If I went to my (male) doctor and he suggested an immunization, I would expect it in the arm. I would expect good reasons for alternatives. I would ask (with genuine curiosity) why he chose this approach. This is without bringing any other factors into play such as different gender, which is not a big deal nor a complete non-issue. A doctor or nurse has a reason for everything they do with a patient, can justify it and will document it.
I listed lots of reasons gluteal injections are not usually the first choice. But if the vaccinations are being done with people waiting in line in their cars, that in itself gives two more reasons.
Thanks. I am pretty comfortable being nude in front of a doctor I would hate to thonk I need to worry about whether the doctor is uncomfortable with me being naked. My comfort is 100% rooted in the idea that this is routine and clinical for the professional.
Your doctor or nurse does not care. But a patient unhappy with their figure, for example, might potentially be sensitive about displaying things without a better reason. Patients vary a great deal in expectations. Your professional should be able to justify every single thing they do for a patient.
I get front of the thigh injections. This means no walk-in pharmacy shots unless I have shorts on. For my cattle-drive COVID shots, I wore shorts under pants and let the nurse know. We went to an exam room and took care of it without my ever being undressed.
I think there were a couple of reasons for vaccinating children in the butt (and giving other shots there, like antibiotics). Children have small arms, so their arms are not appropriate. The thighs work, but children can manually interfere with the injection that way. Babies and toddlers, and even some older children require more restraint to be vaccinated (or given any injection) in the quads, and even the side of the thigh can be difficult. The butt is a place the child cannot reach well with the hands, and can’t see just what is going on.
But now that there’s more concern about children disrobing when it may not be necessary, and about children’s agency, the butt isn’t such a popular place. Some people find the idea of vaccinating a child in a place where they can’t interfere with the shot, and it’s more convenient for the doctor, to be distasteful, in spite of the fact that it also means the child won’t be restrained by having an adult holding their hands at the wrists. That pretty well interferes with the child’s agency.
Children don’t really have the ability to assess risk, or think in the future, and if 1 in 100 children under 7 would choose to be vaccinated given free choice, I would be surprised.
Do you mind sharing the reason you can’t get an upper arm injection? Are you very small, or thin? or do you have scarring? My husband has burn scars on one arm, and can’t get most shots in that arm, but can get them in the other arm.
Apropos of nothing, every time I scroll past this thread title, I can’t help but think of the famous Newlywed Game blooper.
I received my second shot today in NY. Pfizer. The vaccine is an IM, so in theory, you could receive it in the arm, thigh, or butt. The pull-down screen for the nurse giving the shot listed all of these areas as options. I asked for thigh because I was hoping not to have a sore arm at work tomorrow- a leg would be easier. I was told that they can do butt/ thigh, but aren’t at mass vax sites due to privacy, need to move people through quickly, etc. If you get it done somehow by a private MD in an office, yes, you could get what what in the butt, if that is your preferred pound.
Your ass will be very sore though.
I had axillary lymph nodes removed on both sides, so to reduce the risk of developing lymphedema, we don’t use my arms for I injections.
Thanks.
When I worked as an American Sign Language interpreter, if I needed an injection, which was mostly the flu shot, but there was a tetanus in there at one point (probably a DPT), and a couple of times, shots for pain and nausea for really severe migraines, I always asked for them other than the arm.
Pretty much everything I got in the thigh, in front, but there was one thing in the butt, once, and there was something I got in the torso, but I don’t remember what.
I find it much more comfortable in the thigh.
Before that, there was this.
Using the buttock muscles was more common back in the day, because injection volumes tended to be larger.
The only vaccination I know of that was ever given in the abdomen were the old-time rabies shots. Did that ever happen to you?
No, and it may not have been a vaccination. It could have been a pain med, a nausea med, an antibiotic, or even something else. I have a really sensitive stomach, and I’ve had a lot of things injected that other people can take orally.
I haven’t got any sound, so I can tell what they are doing, but that’s not a vaccination syringe. I’ve had injections in my glutes, and in my deltoid, and neither case was a vaccination. All the vaccinations I can remember were just in the skin.
I dunno. Who am I, Bob Eubanks?
When I did get my vaccine it was at the end of a volunteer shift with an “extra” dose from a no show - and I was wearing a long sleeved shirt I couldn’t get my arm free of. I was vaccinated in the supply closet with my shirt off (since the vaccination room at that clinic has at least eight people in it at any given time).
We had one person yesterday who needed (maybe wanted, we didn’t pry) it in their thigh. They took them away to a side room and brought the shot to them.
While in the Navy back in the 70’s, a gal that I had relations with told me her ex told her he had an STD and that she has it now. I went to the base medical clinic to be tested. Found out the Navy at the time did not test for STD’s, you would receive 3 shots of penicillin whether you really needed it or not. The first was in my right butt cheek, the second in the left. Both butt cheeks were still sore when I went in for the third. The medic asked which cheek for the shot, I told him to use either one. He stabbed both in the same spots from the previous shots, giving half the dose in each. I think that helped, instead of one cheek hurting, I had some minor pain in both.